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Inspiration For Your Main Character's Name.

Started by Ancelyn, August 28, 2009, 12:06:24 PM

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Ancelyn

As an Arthurphile I took the name for my character from Dr Who Battlefield. McCoy was quite probably the worst Dr ever (that should be trademarked) but the novelization was actually rather good. Spiffing infact. So Ancelyn was created. I added the d'Outremer because it sounded good, the outsider on the edge of civilisation.  It was obviously going to be my username. It was destiny, or something. So what about your first/main character's name? Where did it come from, why did you choose it and what significance does it have for you and your view of the 40K universe we all love so much?
To see a world in a grain of sand,
And a Heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour.

William Blake

greenstuff_gav

it seems i'm bad at making up names;

Tech Adept Ran Stein; we were listening to Rammstein while i generated his original stats  ;D

Inquisitor Ro Hymunin is mentioned in a small piece of colour text in Rogue Trader so i expanded from there.

Kargos Bloodspitter is from a brilliant quote from 2nd edition Codex Imperialis

Shen Kalara's the only one i made up (cause it sounded cool :lol: ) and she spans several different games :)
i make no apologies, i warned you my ability to roll ones was infectious...

Build Your Imagination

Gnaeus Conlitor

#2
Gnaeus came from my Requiem for Rome character, Conlitor was just a mangling of sylables in my head.

My first Inquisitor Miranda Coteaz was the neice of the Coteaz of Daemonhunters fame. Radical of course!

And Sylvester McCoy was my favourite Doctor.
Inquisitor got me in to roleplaying which in turn kick started my writing career. I am eternally grateful.

psycho

well Marius Dire comes from the Mordheim rule book (the witch hunter that is after the necromancer but eventually turns into one himself) as that name and profile suited my Witch hunter that has become obsessed with tracking down his Ordo Malleus adversary
Inquisitor Davlire Freed
the name kinda came to me whilst playng Fallout 3
theres a guy named Freed on there and davlire was just a random thing in my head
Inquisitor Vikra Hark comes from watching Friends with my girlfriend (phoebes imaginary Boyfriend Vikrum) and reading too much Gaunts Ghosts (commissar Hark)

and im actually pretty goo at making up random names too tell the truth

kerby

Gnaeus Conlitor

One method I use for games with less exotic naming conventions is to pick out two books at random from my bookshelf and use the first name of one author with the surname of another.
Inquisitor got me in to roleplaying which in turn kick started my writing career. I am eternally grateful.

Kaled

Well, my namesake is another Doctor Who reference - the Daleks were created from the remains of the Kaled race, and his first name is Drake after Sir Francis as I wanted something with a bit of a naval feel to it.

Most of my other characters have pretty random names - after actors, directors, authors, singers, people at work and so on, as well as quite a few whose names are completely made up.  A few examples;
- Imperial Guardsman Amos Lynch was named after the singer/songwriter Tori Amos and the movie director David Lynch, but also Amos seemed like the perfect name for a dependable but unimaginative character.
- Similarly, Harry Cronenberg, the gunfighter infected with the obliterator virus was named after Blondie lead singer Deborah Harry and director David Cronenberg who collaborated on the film Videodrome which features bizarre hybrids of man, machine and weapon.
- My female daemonhost is named Elphaba after the wicked witch of the west in Wicked on account of her green skin.
- The savant, Sergei Mentat, is named after the Mentats from Dune on account of him performing a similar role.
- Anton Delis Soylent, the haemovore cultist got his name from Soylent Green.
- The Ordo Sicarius operative, Snake-Eyes, is named after the G.I. Joe character.
- The Naval Stormtrooper, Terence Caine, was named after two famous actors, Terence Stamp and Michael Caine (I imagine under his helmet he bears a close resemblence to Terence Stamp).
- Explorator-Magos Vaal Kryzak's name was completely made up just because I liked the sound of it and I wanted a name beginning with V.
- Tech-Priestess Orla Riall was named after people at work) I just went through the company e-mail directory and picked out names that seem to fit the character).
I like to remember things my own way... Not necessarily the way they happened.

Inquisitor - Blood Bowl - Malifaux - Fairy Meat

MarcoSkoll

Marco Robert Skoll:

- Marco, from Marco Hietala, the bassist/second vocalist from Nightwish, a Finnish Metal band.
- Robert, from my grandfather
- Skoll, from the wolf demi-god in Norse myth that was supposed to devour the sun at Ragnarok.

It all ties into the Nordic theme was going for with the character (although I should note, my grandfather was English - but Robert is used in the Nordic countries).

When I'm looking for less exotic names, I tend to hit the "Behind the Name" website and their random name search: http://www.behindthename.com/random/
You can search for either gender, and most countries. For surnames, modifications of first names can work, or alternatively, Wikipedia has fairly large lists of surnames from each country.

Looking at other names I've used, either for serious characters or background ones, a lot of them had names made up from BTN searches, and most of them can be matched to a single country.
Eryn Wynn is a deliberately Celtic name, Pavol Kocur a Slovak one, Henrik Jenci Weisz a Hungarian name, Lyra Joandra Rhodes made up of obscure English names...

One of the few examples where I had a deliberate name in my head was for "Frost", whose first name I chose as Marie, because it was a name that I'd least associate with a highly dangerous mercenary. Similar reason to why I decided to make her only just over 5 feet tall.
Sometimes it's a good thing to have a character who doesn't conform to any kinds of stereotypes the mind might have.
S.Sgt Silva Birgen: "Good evening, we're here from the Adeptus Defenestratus."
Captain L. Rollin: "Nonsense. Never heard of it."
Birgen: "Pick a window. I'll demonstrate".

GW's =I= articles

Tullio

Well, my namesake I chose on a whim, much like most of my character names. Tullio is a psyker, who's just gained model form - his name I got from The Subtle Knife, for now real reason. His master, Inquisitor Lord Dantini somehow evolved after reading about an italian trader named Francesco di Marco Datini. Dantini is the scion of a powerful trading dynasty.

Among the other major characters are Marin da Massilia (Her character is rather complicated as to how she came around, but the reason I chose the name is simply because I thought it cute) and Baldasure Terrenon. I forget where Baldasure comes from, but Terrenon is pinched from A Wizard of Earthsea. He has a pet psyber-crow.

Those are the names that immediately come to mind, mostly because I use them most in roleplays and so forth

Tullio

1337inquisitor

Talos- the name of the ninth god in oblivion
Darkblayde- inspiration from the INQ rulebook itself
Gilford- long story
Zephyr- a very dictionary way of saying a light breeze
Zephial- taken straight from the fire emblem 6 character
No honey, the true moral of the story is never put down your weapon.

Homer Simpson

Ynek

Most of my names tend to just get plucked out of thin air, but here are a few names that had a slightly more scientific method behind them:


Ynek Rend - Ynek's first name is my own first name backwards (minus one "N" to make it seem more sci-fi and less recognisable). His second name is the second half of my surname backwards.

Evad Ivanovich Kistrovaga - Inquisitor Evad's first name is Dave backwards. Ivanovich was the name of the animated corpse in the first Hellboy movie, and Kistrovaga was just a name that I came up with which seemed to have the right "soviet" feel to it that fits in with the character's background.

Thaddeus Marcus Morgathikhai - Thaddeus was the name of a villain in a TV show that I used to watch as a child, and it is also the name of Peter Griffin's evil twin from Family Guy. Marcus was the name of the guy in Gears of War, and Morgathikhai was the surname of my first ever Inquisitor Character. I decided to name my most recent inquisitor after him as a sign of tribute.

Sophie Vandus - Sophie is my best friend at university, and Vandus was the result of playing around with the name "Vandire" for a few minutes.

Eldreth Dramathire - Her first name was loosely based upon the name of the grand villain in Baldur's Gate - Dark alliance. "Dramathire" was based loosly upon the name of a friend's Dark Eldar Lord.

"Dirty-face" - As the name suggests, he has a dirty face.

"Scar-face" - As the name suggests, he has a scarred face.

Aerin Anastasia Zukovsky - As she hails from the same planet as Inquisitor Evad, I thought I would try to keep the "soviet" feel of the names intact. The name Aerin came from the popular TV show "Farscape." Anastasia was the name of the exiled Russian princess, and Zukovsky was the surname of James Bond's Russian contact, played by Robbie Coltrane in Goldeneye.

Dmitry Zavorotko - Again, as the governor of Gellar's World hails from the same world as Inquisitor Evad and Lady Aerin, I decided to give him a distinctly "soviet" name. The name Dmitry came up in a google search, and the surname 'Zavorotko' is the name of the grand villain in the PS2 game: Hitman 2, silent assassin.

Pyrekeeper Silas - Silas was named after the albino monk in "The Da Vinci code". He has no surname, as he cast it away when he joined the Redemptionist movement. In his eyes, the Redemption is his family now.

Lord Nethis - Comes from my full first name "KenNETH".
"Somehow, Inquisitor, when you say 'with all due respect,' I don't think that you mean any respect at all."

"I disagree, governor. I think I am giving you all of the respect that you are due..."

Dust King

Leon Haast: Leon because I liked the sound of it, Haast for the patron of the local museum (he was an early explorer/biologest in NZ and has many species named after him including a eagle with a 3m wingspan)

Amanda 'manda' Jordan: Aliens reference, 'manda' from salamander, a reference to 'newt' aka Rebecca Jordan. Also I didn't realise this until later but Ripley's daughter was called Amanda.

Seth Auroch: Seth Bullock from deadwood

Kyle Palmer: Kyle Reese from Terminator and Harry Palmer, a spy character played by Michel Cain.

Nade Skanek: Acronym of 'Naked Snake" from the metal gear solid games.

Myriad

I have to admit to simply making names up for the most part.

Evandon and Ylla are both chosen to sound suitably aristocratic, 'Jedd' to be a largely anonymous name chosen as such by my eldar outcaste.  The only name with any particular inspiration was calling my knarloc Gru on a whim.  Maybe I'll be inspired when I name my kroot  :).
I had better point out, that some of the clubs I represent are of a military bent.

You know what you are?  A plywood shark!

precinctomega

Morpheus Braman got his first name from the Matrix movies.  That's pretty much as derivative as I get.  Oh, Aldus Murphy got his surname from Robocop, but "Murphy" is a traditional American police officers' name.

R.

Thuellai

My Mechanicus warband's names have been partly out of Behind the Name, and partly out of Dune.

Cibran, Vartan, and Isabel are all BTN contributions.  Magos Basileus was chosen because it means "King", and Sahiya is a Dune reference, which I felt was appropriate for a character from a desert-like Death World.

Hadriel Caine

cool topic Ancelyn. I fear I am not as clever as the majority of clavers seem to be with regard to including references in names. lets see.

Inquisitor Jakart. Jakart is a feral Ork world in the Segmentum pacificus. Kallastin (used as his surname with untrustworthy contacts) is another planet not so far away. not so imaginative!

My Dark Angel Hadriel is named after the angel outside diablo's throne room in Diablo 2.

Ga'reus Reynard is a bastardisation of Gary and the French word for fox as he is a good scout.

Aldous Prowse is named after the author of Brave new world (Aldous Huxley) and the second part of a friend's double barrelled surname.

Khonig Gronemeyer is named after the German rock musician Herbert Gronemeyer. Khonig is simply a shortening of Khorne, suggesting his Chaotic tendencies.

Isaak is named after our missing colleague. the character is shadowy and enigmatic...
The Fall of Astraea
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